GIS IN UNDERGRADUATE RESEARCH: SELECTIVELY HONING TOOLS OF THE TRADE

Geographic Information Systems are an effective means to integrate and organize geographically keyed data and hence have great potential as a research tool in the geosciences. Moreover, experience in GIS is currently recognized as desirable for many jobs in the geological and environmental sciences. Incorporating GIS into undergraduate research can enhance the value of students’ experiences by introducing them to both a powerful interdisciplinary research tool and a marketable skill. However, GIS encompasses a large and complex body of knowledge, so its integration into research programs at small institutions that lack a Geography Department or other on-site geographic expertise can be a challenge.

We have used GIS as an undergraduate summer research tool for four years in separate projects: mapping coastal dunes and compiling a database of fossil occurrences in the Michigan Basin. We do not provide specific GIS classes or intensive instruction, but students doing summer research are familiar with maps (although not GIS) from previous coursework. We have found that even without formal instruction students are good at using online and text manuals, tutorials, and faculty consultation to teach themselves to use GIS software to accomplish well-defined, specific tasks related to research goals of the overall project. Examples include projecting and manipulating base map data, plotting localities cited in the literature, and drawing maps from field data. Because GIS serves as a data archive, new researchers can pick up where previous students left off, enabling students to participate in larger and longer-term faculty-supervised research projects. Inexperienced researchers do run into roadblocks and require additional startup time so GIS projects can take several years to complete but can yield publishable results over that timeframe.

Our approach does not make students experts at GIS but it does provide them with a user’s familiarity and with confidence to approach GIS as another software tool in their arsenal of problem-solving techniques.